The only two tool handles (holders) you need in your shop

American Woodturner (Feb. 2012) features a project on using insert nuts to make tool handles/holders. Simply drill two holes—on the endgrain and face to accept the nut and screw. If you don’t have a lathe, you can buy a handle blank and modify it.

I made two holders—a large nut and a small one—to cater for large tangs/files/rasps and small/mini files respectively. I cut a regular nut smaller for the small holder.

One can also add a ferrule to the design. I found the supplies from LVT:

8 comments so far

cool, but really, I’d rather just grab a file and use it, without having to mount it first. Most of my files, I made handles for when I got my first lathe, figured it was good practice. Now, I just look at a handle as fun time turning. Something you can turn, where you can not screw up hardly, as there are no plans, and the only one who will use the work piece is you!

That’s really cool. It’s also a really safe idea, the ends of the files can gash your hand up pretty bad. It’s never happened to me, but I remember being told to never use one without a handle. Nice work.

Apart from safety consideration, a handle is necessary for these occasions:

a) When using a round file, the handle allows one to roll the file and use all the teeth as one pushes the file forward.b) When using a large rasp to hog out a lot of materials or when using a file/rasp for a long period of time, a handle keeps the strain on the fingers/hand to the minimum.